China is facing a grim winter and a giant superspreading event: Corona has the country firmly in its grasp, but the government is downplaying the danger.
Munich/Beijing – Seven dead: This is China’s official record since the country surprisingly ended its zero-Covid policy nearly two weeks ago and decided to let the virus run free. Authorities reported the first two deaths on Monday, followed by five more a day later. These are numbers that hardly anyone in China believes. A look at social media reveals just how dramatic the situation is: images from Beijing’s Tongzhou district are being shared, showing hearses queuing outside a crematorium. Or videos showing long lines in front of a hospital in Shanghai. And above all personal stories: about his grandfather who died after being infected – or about people with a fever who stand in front of pharmacies bought empty and don’t know what to do.
In large Chinese cities, large parts of the population appear to have been infected with the corona virus within a few days. Some companies report that 90% of their employees are ill and many hospitals are understaffed. The city of Chongqing even felt compelled to send “slightly symptomatic” state, party and government employees back to work. According to reports, people with fever are also creeping into the factories of Apple supplier Foxconn.
The pathogen has an easy time in a population that has not been able to develop herd immunity and has a relatively low vaccination rate. Furthermore, many Chinese have received their last dose of vaccination several months ago. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps a few million, are likely to be infected every day. There are no reliable figures, the Chinese health authority currently reports only a few thousand cases a day. And everyone knows that can’t be true.
Corona in China: Karl Lauterbach sees a ‘very worrying situation’
It’s just the beginning of a wave that’s getting bigger and bigger. “Very worrying situation in China,” Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach wrote on Twitter on Tuesday about a tweet from epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding. The US scientist had shared a video of a completely overcrowded hospital room where several people were being ventilated. “The deaths will likely be in the millions,” Feigl-Ding predicted. It is not possible to verify when and where the video of the shock was recorded and Feigl-Ding is not undisputed in the United States. However, other forecasts for China also predict a worrying development.
A model from the University of Hong Kong, for example, predicts nearly a million deaths in extreme cases. If China continues with its opening policy without taking adequate countermeasures, 684 people per million people would die, scientists said. With a total population of 1.4 billion people, this would mean around 965,000 victims. According to the study, the government can still prevent the worst from happening. A multi-pronged approach including vaccination, antiviral treatment, public health and social measures, and a phased reopening is essential. Indeed, hospitals are popping up across the country and new intensive care units are opening. What is missing is well trained staff. Even state media admit it.
The opposite of a “gradual reopening” was announced on Monday by the capital Beijing. The virus is spreading “rapidly” and putting pressure on the health system, a city spokesman said – and at the same time explained that the coronavirus measures would be eased even further. Bars, gyms and karaoke clubs can now reopen in Beijing and holiday trips to the capital have also been allowed.
Will the Chinese Spring Festival become a super-spread event?
After Chinese cities and provinces overtook each other with tough measures in the three years of the zero-Covid policy, a competition now seems to have broken out over who will implement the central government’s guidelines faster and relax more. China’s impatient return to normalcy is fueled by state propaganda, which has made an astonishing turnaround since the late November protests. Just a few months ago, the country’s health authorities stressed that the dangers of the omicron variant should not be minimized, today government adviser Zhong Nanshan explains that Covid-19 should simply be called the “corona cold”. Irrational alarmism has given way to dangerous banalities.
By the end of January it may become clear what a bitter bill China has to pay for its policy of haphazard opening. Then the most populous country on earth celebrates its most important holiday, the Spring Festival. This is likely to be a superspreading event in the middle of winter: Before the pandemic started, some 400 million people traveled to their families and friends every year to celebrate Chinese New Year together. Many return from cities to the countryside, from parents or grandparents and therefore from the most vulnerable sections of the population and in regions with an underdeveloped health system.
The government wants to prevent the worst with a vaccination campaign. Currently, only about 40 percent of people over 80 in China have been vaccinated three times, and a nationwide campaign to promote the fourth vaccination was recently launched. But many Chinese are very skeptical of Made in China vaccines. And by the way: why should you get vaccinated right now when the state assures you that the virus is no more dangerous than the flu?
